July 14, 2004

Questions from you, answers from me

Weight gain will always be a constant concern for me. I went to the Dr.'s office yesterday and was not surprised to see that I now weigh 150 lbs. My comfort weight is about 144. It may seem like a little, especially to the morbidly obese. What's just a few lbs? I'm convinced that's how I got morbidly obese. So, over the next few weeks, I'll put some extra effort into losing the extra lbs I gained on vacation last week.

I get a lot of emails concerning my weight loss surgery. I'm going to address the questions that I receive here.

Hi Amanda, My Name is removed for privacy and I'm from somewhere in the US. Tomorrow night I am going to an open forum for bariatric surgery with a co-worker that has had the surgery and is doing real well. I am going so I can learn more about it and make up my mind once and for all If this is what I want to do. I am 42, 5'2 and weigh 230 lbs. I have been over weight my whole life. It has only been the last 15 years of my life that I have been above 190. But I can feel the numbers climbing as I sit here and write to you because I just had a major pig out and I feel so miserable. I am so sick of wearing comfortable loose clothes or clothes that cover too much of me when it is hot outside. I want to wear nice clothes and in the summer time I want to wear shorts and a tank top like every one else as opposed to Capri's and a long baggy t-shirt. I want so badly to be able to cross my legs or sit in a folding chair with out cringing that the person behind me is looking at my body ooze over the seat. I have a supporting husband, of course he's one of those thin men that eats whatever he wants. His first reaction was that he thought this was awful drastic just to loose weight but I reminded him of how many times I have tried and failed and how upsetting it is to me. I also have two daughters age 21 and 22, both have great figures. although the weight creeps up on them every now and then and I encourage them to loose those 10 before it becomes 20,30 or more. And they do. One daughter told me, "Mom if you do this surgery and loose all that weight you will be so beautiful I will be so happy for you I'll cry." She's engaged and I'm sure she'd like a slim mother at her wedding next year. So would I. Well Amanda, now that you know my history I will tell you that as bad as I want this surgery is as nervous as I am to do it. I have had surgeries before, gallbladder, back surgery, appendix, etc. so I'm not afraid of the procedure. I am scared of the things that may go wrong. I'm so scared that I could die from this. One in every 200 ya know? that one could be me, it has to be someone. All though I am obese I am relatively healthy. My blood tests are great. Cholesterol, triglicerides etc. are all better than normal. I have border-line high blood pressure. My mother has been on meds for it for the past 10 years; her mother and grandmother both died from high pressure, one of a stroke and one a heart attack. I have had two back surgeries for a herniated disc ( the awful thing is that I got it from struggling to get off the floor, trying to convince myself I was in shape enough to sit on the floor, huh, wrong . It's embarrassing when the docs say, oh herniated disc, were you in a car accident........) so I know loosing this weight is going to change my whole life and I am so excited for that. I hate being fat !! I'm sick of overeating, but I can't seem to stop myself. So I know this procedure is right for me. I'm just so scared. Please tell me your thoughts. We're you afraid? How uncomfortable were you and for how long afterwards? How did you tolerate food at first and how are you tolerating it now? Do you know anyone who has had a bad experience from this? Thank you for being available for questions. I will write again and let you know my final decision after I meet with the doctor at the open forum tomorrow night.

I was afraid, actually, terrified would more accurately describe my feelings. Before I went into surgery I wrote letters to everyone that I loved and made plans "just in case". As afraid that I was of death, I was afraid of losing my relationship with food. It was where I turned whenever I needed someone. Making the decision to have a gastric bypass requires that you are willing to give up food. The hardest part of the surgery wasn't the surgery part. It was the weeks and months immediately following when I wanted to eat a piece of pizza, or a hamburger, and just couldn't. I was limited to soft foods and yogurt, and I was miserable. The mental part of it was much more difficult than the surgical aspect. I had discomfort in eating some foods for a long time. I still can't handle most breads. I have to take the crusts off of everything I eat. If I eat too much bread, it lays like a brick in my stomach. Pasta's and rice make me very tired. I was unable to eat any kind of sugar for a long time. I can tolerate sugar now, but still have some minor dumping from time to time. I began to become more selective about the foods that I ate, and actually enjoyed sitting down to a meal. I began to eat foods that I wouldn't have eaten before. I now love eating vegetables. I love to cook now. I love to make difficult recipes that require a lot of ingredients and patience. I have a more healthy relationship with food now. If I had known that I would, I wouldn't have feared the loss of my relationship with food.

Also, I don't want to disqualify any information about the mortality rates of this surgery, because I haven't done any research, and I do not know. But I find it hard to believe that 1 in 200 people die from this surgery. Perhaps it is accurate. In the past 2 years, since the surgery has become more popular, more doctors have been doing surgeries. Doctors who may or may not be specifically trained in surgery, much less gastric bypasses. My number one information to people considering surgeons is to do your homework. For example, I knew my surgeon had had 1 death in 1200 patients. His complication rate was also very low. I don't know why 1 in 200 deaths seems to be the accepted norm. I've met hundreds of people in all stages of the process, pre-op, post-op, old post-ops. I don't know a single person who has died from it. I know only a few people who have had serious complications, and even then, it was "a friend of a friend" of someone I knew. For me, the choice was easy. I chose to take the slim chance of death and improve my life, versus continuing to be fat and die anyway of one of the many diseases I was bound to get from being so obese. I was miserable. There really was no choice. But I was still scared.

If you have a question that you'd like answered, email it to me: eskieluvr@hotmail.com

Posted by Manda on July 14, 2004 9:42 AM